One of Italy's most wanted mafia bosses was arrested Sunday after two decades on the run, fleeing a life sentence for murder, the authorities announced.
Ernesto Fazzalari, 46, was captured in the early hours of the morning in an apartment in a remote part of the southern region of Calabria, home to the notorious 'Ndrangheta organised crime syndicate.
Fazzalari was the second most-wanted mafia fugitive after "superboss" Matteo Messina Denaro, a suspected leader of the Sicilian mafia, Cosa Nostra.
On the run since 1996, Fazzalari was convicted in absentia in 1999 of mafia association, kidnapping, illegal possession of weapons and a double homicide linked to a bloody 1989-91 feud which left 32 people dead in his home town of Taurianova.
His arrest was hailed by the government as a significant victory for the state in its battle against what is now considered Italy's most powerful mafia group.
"Thank you to the judges and the forces of order. Viva l'Italia," Prime Minister Matteo Renzi wrote in a tweet.
Interior Minister Angelino Alfano described Fazzalari as "one of the most important fugitives and a leading underworld figure."
He added: "This shows that you cannot run from justice. These are the kind of victories that encourage and support us in the difficult but winnable fight against organised crime."
Notoriously ruthless, the 'Ndrangheta has surpassed Sicily's Cosa Nostra and the Naples-based Camorra thanks to the wealth it has amassed as the principal importer and wholesaler of cocaine produced in Latin America and smuggled into Europe via north Africa and southern Italy.
That trade is worth billions and previous police operations have indicated that the 'Ndrangheta has well-established links with Colombian producer cartels, Mexican crime gangs and mafia families in New York and other parts of North America.
The organisation is made up of numerous village and family-based clans based in Calabria, the rural, mountainous and under-developed "toe" of Italy's boot.
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